


Skin Deep

by EvilRobotCat



Series: Fear [4]
Category: Compilation of Final Fantasy VII
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-14
Updated: 2019-05-20
Packaged: 2019-06-10 04:57:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 10,908
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15284160
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EvilRobotCat/pseuds/EvilRobotCat
Summary: (Set ten years after ACC.)  Nightmares of Sephiroth leave wounds on Cloud's body.  He worries they're not dreams, but a warning.  Who can help him?  Who would even believe him?





	1. Only Dreams

 Cloud often dreamed of Aerith. Warm and smiling, she would take his hands in hers and lead him. Whether it was a field of flowers or the old slums of Midgar, it didn't matter where they went. All he paid attention to was her. Not every dream was pleasant. Sometimes he saw her cold and bloody, lying on the floor of the church, judging him with lifeless eyes. Haunting as they were, the nightmares provided the balance Cloud needed to wake up each day. He accepted both visions as nothing more than fantasies his own mind conjured up while he slept.

While a part of him would always yearn for the friend he had lost, Cloud was grateful to know the dreams were meaningless. Aerith's spirit didn't appear to him idly. Seeing the real thing would be an omen of something dark to come. He hadn't seen her in ten years, not since the Remnants' siege on Edge. He doubted he would see her again for the rest of his life. The planet deserved that long without being in crisis, at least.

But for the past few weeks, someone else had occupied Cloud's slumbering mind. His only warnings were the scent of vanilla and the creak of leather gloves tightening around the hilt of a sword. There was the distinct hum of metal cutting through air, and then a tall, strong body lunged at him, weapon drawn. From that moment forward, every night Cloud was caught in a death match that lasted from sunset to sunrise.

There was no warm up to ease him into battle, no break to let him catch his breath or even question his attacker. Failure in the dreams resulted in injuries that carried over into the waking world. Every morning Cloud awoke with fresh wounds that stung from his sweat and arms that trembled from swinging his sword against an inexhaustible foe. Hour after hour, night after night Cloud was forced to fight for his life without even knowing why.

At least he never had to ask _who_ it was. There was only one person on the planet who'd attack Cloud in his own mind like this, who derived sick pleasure from making him suffer.

Sephiroth.

The dreams were getting stronger. They were practice, he knew in a way he couldn't explain. Not for Cloud's benefit. Sephiroth was using him to prepare - but for what? Beside the obvious, Cloud was at a loss.

Heavy stuff like politics and religion went over his head. That didn't usually bother him. He didn't need to be a scholar to survive in the wilderness. All he needed to know was how to ride and how to fight. But now he found himself wishing for some of Cid's hard-boiled wisdom or Tifa's heartfelt instinct.

He hadn't mentioned the dreams to his friends. He didn't need a lecture on the power of imagination, not at his age. Cloud wasn't one to get lost in a world of play pretend. He'd worked too hard to come to grips with reality. Stripped of all the illusions and ghosts of his past, Cloud had finally learned to like the person he was, flaws and all. He was proud of the life he'd built for himself. He just wished he could understand Sephiroth's plan without having to ask for help.

Cloud kicked away the sheets and swung his feet to the side of the bed. The memories of the dream and the soreness in his body took a backseat as he looked at the things scattered on the bedside table. Registration papers for a motorcycle, resignation papers he'd been asked to witness for some unholy reason, and on the PHS, a deceptively cordial invitation to speak with the director of the WRO.

It didn't take imagination or psychic abilities to know Reeve was pissed. Cloud dreaded the meeting as much as Sephiroth, for entirely different reasons. He'd put it off for a week now. If he waited any longer, he'd probably be dragged there by the commissioner's strongest soldiers. Or worse, his personal Turk.

Vincent. The one person who might have listened to Cloud, who'd probably know exactly what Sephiroth was up to and how to stop him. But Cloud couldn't ask for his help, not right now. A year ago - hell, a _month_ ago. But not anymore, not since...

 

* * *

 

Cloud didn't like Reeve.

It wasn't that he used to work for Shinra - still did, if the rumors were true. It wasn't that his cat snooped around in everyone's business and reported everything back to him. Sure, those were reasons not to trust him, but there was more to it than that.

For one thing, Reeve was bossy. He was polite, but he didn't ask favors. He told people what to do, and he expected them to obey. Who did he think he was, some kind of king? Worse, everyone did what he said, even Cloud. Even _Vincent_ , and he never did _anything_ just because somebody told him to! Was that what it meant to be a former Shinra director? It was a dangerous kind of power, especially coming from a man who wouldn't raise his voice to be heard in a crowded room.

For another, Cloud never knew when he was looking at Reeve's real face - literally or figuratively. The man had a robotic double that looked just like him. That wasn't saying much for the robot. Reeve only had three emotions, and all of them were fake. Despite Cait Sith's dramatic mannerisms, Cloud had never seen Reeve lose control of his warm but distant persona. Maybe there wasn't a real person at all. Maybe they were a bunch of robots with no master.

"Cloud, I'm glad you could come." Reeve's voice was deep and mellow like always. "Won't you sit down?"

"Rather not. I don't wanna stay long."

"Sit down."

Cloud's sullen frown remained, but he sank into the chair before Reeve's desk. The older man took a seat behind the desk and folded his fingers atop it.

"I hear your company is expanding," Reeve acknowledged with a careful smile.

"Get to the point," Cloud muttered before his bravado could run out. They both knew why he'd been called here.

The smile thinned.

"Expanding by one," Reeve continued. There was an edge in his voice. The first ever crack in his rock-hard facade. "One in particular. I believe I made my feelings on the matter clear some time ago."

"Denzel's old enough to do what he wants."

"Yes, but he shouldn't throw his life away crossing wastelands on a motorcycle."

"Something wrong with what I do for a living?"

"You know there isn't, but Denzel doesn't have the same physical enhancements you do. He can't endure that kind of life. His future is here, with the WRO. I want you to explain the importance of that to him, and what a mistake he's making-"

"Not interested."

The smile vanished completely.

Nobody refused an order from the head of the WRO. And sure as hell, nobody told him off in his own office. People who got too close to Reeve with bad intentions had a tendency to disappear. But Cloud wasn't here to hurt Reeve. He was here to support Denzel. Something flipped in Cloud's stomach, but he held onto his grimace like a shield and doubled down on his resistance.

"You know better than I do he's not cut out for the wilderness."

"So?  You can't keep him locked up."

"That's not what I want, Cloud."

"Sure tried."

"He spent several years doing field work just like every other soldier," Reeve corrected with a deepening frown of his own. "It's true I moved him to office work, but only to develop his leadership skills. Don't you care about his safety? He deserves to live a good life and have a high position in the organization."

"Well that's not what _he_ wants," Cloud retorted. "Denzel only joined the WRO to learn how to fight and save up for a motorcycle. He knows it's just Shinra in disguise. And he asked to work for me on his own."

The final straw snapped. Reeve slammed a fist on the desk and met Cloud's ice with fire.

"Only because you filled his head up with some kind of rugged fairy tale about life on the highways-"

"That's enough."

The voice that interrupted their argument was quiet, but it sent a chill through Cloud's blood. Reeve's voice died away like the air had been sucked out of his lungs. Maybe it had, given the owner of that voice. Vincent stepped out of a shadow like he'd been part of it. When had he come into the office? Had he been there the whole time? Cloud had no plan to ask - but Vincent's attention was on Reeve, anyway.

"Cloud confirmed it was Denzel's idea. He can't change his mind any more than you could."

Cloud stared. Had Vincent just taken his side? It must have come as a shock to Reeve as well, because he didn't have a response. His cordial mask shattered, Reeve's face opened up to reveal every emotion at once: rage at Cloud's defiance, fear of Vincent's stare boring into him, and a desperate plea for sympathy that would go unanswered.

In that moment Cloud understood that somewhere along the way in his life, he'd put faith in Reeve's robotic countenance. Seeing that he was as vulnerable as any other man was unsettling.  Dreams couldn't cause injury. Cait Sith couldn't be human. Rock hard facts Cloud relied on when nothing else made sense weren't real after all. Something shifted in his mind, as subtle and important as a key turning in a lock. What kind of door was about to open?

Outside of Cloud's thoughts, the tension between the three men waned. Defeated, Reeve's fists slowly unclenched and his features settled into something Cloud couldn't identify. Still addressing the director, Vincent's eyes shifted to Cloud.

"I'll show him out."

 

* * *

 

Cloud figured Vincent would walk him to the hall, but not lead him all the way outside the building, let alone accompany him to where Fenrir was parked. Vincent stopped just shy of the motorcycle and watched Cloud with serious eyes. The hair on the back of Cloud's neck bristled, and he wondered if Vincent had something bad planned for him after all.

"Denzel is the only semblance of family Reeve has left in this world," Vincent said in the same quiet tone he'd used in the office. "He planned out the course of Denzel's life with more care than he gives to his own."

"Yeah, but why? They're not..." Cloud's reasoning failed before he could complete the thought. Denzel wasn't _his_ son, either, not by blood. 

"And now Denzel has rejected that life to follow in your footsteps. Reeve only calls on you when the terrain is too dangerous for his soldiers to survive. I've never seen him this furious.  And afraid."

In the presence of his only living idol, Cloud's shoulders hunched. With a silent apology to Denzel, he humbly muttered, "Look, I'll talk to-"

"Nothing Reeve does will persuade Denzel to change his mind," Vincent continued as if Cloud hadn't spoken at all.  "If Denzel is strong enough to withstand Reeve, he'll do fine out there.  He's had a good role model"

Cloud looked away and scratched an itch at the back of his neck. That role model... did Vincent really mean Cloud?  Vincent didn't compliment anyone. How was he supposed to react to something that didn't happen?

"Uh. Yeah."

Nailed it.

Cloud inwardly groaned.

Vincent turned with a swish of his cape, and with that, the sulky vampire was gone, no doubt returning to Reeve's side to weather the storm alone, fearless as always.

 

* * *

 

The ride home wasn't long enough, so Cloud pointed his wheels northward and headed for Kalm. There wasn't a reason to go there, but he'd think of one along the way. It wasn't every day a person saw Reeve's dark side or Vincent's kindness. That wasn't something a man brought home with him, not without a lengthy ride to clear his mind. No orders, no people, just Cloud and Fenrir.

At this speed every sense was overwhelmed into dullness. The wind howled in his ears and flew past his face so fast there wasn't time to smell or taste it. There was nothing but sight and sensation, and far enough outside the city even those lost their hold over Cloud. Everything looked the same out here, nothing but rocks and scrubby plants and the highway. The vibration of the engine no longer felt like it would shake him apart. It lulled him. While his mako-sharp senses guided Fenrir over the shifting black ribbon before him, Cloud let his mind wander.

A good role model.

Against his shyness, Cloud smiled. Vincent didn't hand out kind words to anyone who wanted them. His praise must be earned, and he still gave almost nothing. When Vincent said something nice it had that much more weight, because he meant it. Had he given a similar talk to Denzel? Cloud would have to ask him on their first job together.

Their first job together. A few hours ago, the thought made Cloud's stomach clench, but now it filled him with pride.

Denzel had his own bike now. He'd accompanied Cloud on jobs since he was fifteen, and slain countless monsters for the WRO, but Cloud still wasn't ready to let him strike out on his own. Not for the first few deliveries, at least. It was different going out all alone. A parent couldn't help worrying a little.

Maybe Cloud and Reeve understood each other a little better than either wanted to admit. Reeve just wanted to pass a different torch to Denzel, that was all.

_Handing over responsibility to someone else? That's not the Cloud I know._

The words were spoken so softly, Cloud shouldn't have been able to hear them. The sound of them sent a shiver throughout his body. He raised his eyes from the road to scan for their source, knowing full well it wouldn't be seen unless it wanted to. In the same instant, something narrow pushed into his back, through his middle and out the front of him as easily as if he were paper. Before his body even registered pain, Cloud recognized the blade. It was Sephiroth's Masamune, the same one he'd been fending off in his sleep for weeks. The only difference was that this time Cloud was fully awake. Did that mean Sephiroth had reached a new threshold of strength? Or had he always been able to manifest in the waking world?

Perhaps it was jealousy that made him bolder. Cloud was preparing to enter a different life stage, but Sephiroth's had been eternally sealed the moment his body entered the Lifestream. This new Cloud, a man with adult children and an established career, wasn't consumed with thoughts of old grudges, but of his family and friends, of mundane interactions with irate clients. A man who passed the reigns of his business into younger hands was just as likely to hang up his sword for good and take up chocobo farming instead. Sephiroth would soon have no place in Cloud's life, so he forced himself to the forefront of his mind in the most violent way possible.

Yes, that may be the reason, if Sephiroth were in control of himself, but he had been a puppet of Jenova since his death. He was no more the man Cloud once knew than Cloud was the boy he'd been so many years ago. The foe wearing Sephiroth's face was an otherworldly being hungry for death and destruction. Cloud alone wasn't enough to satisfy its morbid appetite. And yet Cloud constantly found himself prey for Jenova and her human-shaped son. This time he hadn't managed to anticipate the attack.

What remained to be seen were the consequences of his failure.

Speared and helpless, Cloud was lifted and thrown from Fenrir like a toy. A fucking puppet, he concluded, furious at his own weakness as his body slammed hard into gravel. Rocks and sand cut through his clothing and into his skin. His body came to a stop when it struck a patch of scraggly brush growing around a boulder.

Unguided, Fenrir veered onto its side and plowed forward, rendered into a half ton battering ram going a hundred miles per hour. It screeched an agonized chorus into the asphalt, and Cloud spared a moment of gratitude that he was alone on the highway.

Alone but for _him._

Lying on his side, Cloud turned his attention to his stomach, stained red with blood. It was no hallucination. To be so lucky, Cloud thought bitterly. But the blade was gone, and its wielder didn't attack him further. Why not? Sephiroth didn't show that kind of mercy. Shadows swept over him and blocked out the harsh sunlight, then parted just as quickly to expose him once more. Cloud squinted up into the blinding rays and got his answer.

Sephiroth was engaged in battle with someone else.

"I see Angeal has left his dog unchained," Sephiroth taunted bitterly as he launched himself forward in one of his famous One-Hit-One-Kill attacks. His blade met a wedge of solid mythril. Sparks flew into the air, brighter than the desert sunlight. It wasn't just any chunk of metal. Cloud had seen it hundreds, thousands of times - every time he visited the church to memorialize the friends he had lost. Having precious few memories of their lives, Cloud's mind had instead preserved the scent of the flowers and the shape of the sword that rested in their center. But that sword was blunt and covered in rust. This one shone like it was fresh from the forge, new and whole.

Under the massive weapon sprang black hair that bristled like a porcupine's. Cloud pushed himself up on one arm, only to fall back to his side with a hiss of pain and a fresh splash of wetness over his fingers. He had to see the face of his rescuer! Knowing in the deepest corners of his soul who it was, he still had to see!

With a determined grunt beneath it, the heavy blade pushed forward, pitching Sephiroth back. His black boots carved deep trenches in the sand mere feet from Cloud, and for once, both Sephiroth and Cloud paid no attention to each other, but to the man before them.

He swung his sword over his head and brought it down with a mighty swing. The strongest warrior would be forced to let it drop to the ground, but he held it level to his waist using only the strength of one lean-muscled arm. His lake-blue eyes were shadowed by a frown, but he flashed the pair a confident grin and brushed his nose with the wrist of his free hand.

"Zack." Cloud didn't know if he spoke aloud or if his voice could even be heard over the howling desert wind.

"Sorry, Cloud," Zack acknowledged with a nod, his eyes still centered on Sephiroth. "I know you like to fight your own battles, but this guy's not playin' fair. No pun intended, heh."

"This isn't any business of yours," Sephiroth glared. His sword remained drawn to the side, hovering at the ready like Zack's, each waiting for the other to make a move. "It's a matter between Cloud and myself."

"That's not what the planet says," Zack countered. He tightened his grip on the hilt of the Buster. "And if you wanna mess with her, you gotta get through me first."

Sephiroth raised the Masamune barely an inch, and the air around the three brimmed with electricity. For the barest fraction of a moment, he looked as if he would lunge, but he leaned back and let his sword fall away to nothing.

"You've brought even more unwelcome company," he remarked. The words prompted Cloud to return his focus to Sephiroth, but no explanation followed. Taking a step backward, seemingly into the same abyss his sword had fallen to, Sephiroth gave Cloud an eerily friendly nod. "We'll finish this another time."

And just like that, Sephiroth and his influence vanished. The pain in Cloud's body; not just the fresh wound in his stomach, but the soreness in his muscles and the half-healed tears in his flesh from countless nights of torment were nothing but bad memories. Confused, Cloud sat up and looked down at his open palm. It should be covered in his own blood, but it was clean. The only indication of what Cloud had experienced was in his sandy, tattered clothing. Did that mean that Zack, too, had-

Cloud looked up with a gasp.

"Hey, buddy," Zack greeted him with a shrug that hinted at shyness. "You mad at me? I didn't wanna steal your thunder, but-"

Cloud's pulse surged in his limbs. With energy he hadn't felt minutes before he dragged himself to his feet and ran toward the vision. He didn't know what he would do when he reached it. Run right through it and into the highway, he guessed, but he bumped into hard muscle and threw his arms around it.

"Whoa- hey," Zack gasped. He let out a wheezing laugh and reached up under Cloud's arms to pat his back. "It's okay, Cloud. I'm not goin' anywhere."

"Promise!" Cloud shouted into Zack's sweater. It was hot and full of sand from the fight, but it smelled like him. Cloud hadn't even known he could remember what Zack smelled like, but he did, and this was it! He closed his eyes tighter and pushed his face harder into the knit cables. If he opened his eyes, he knew it would go away again.

"I promise." Zack's voice softened. Still patting Cloud's back, his other hand settled atop Cloud's head and ruffled the spiky yellow tufts. "C'mon, it's okay. Open up."

Slow as a fawn taking its first steps, Cloud drew his face away from Zack's chest and opened his eyes. The black sweater before him rose and fell with each breath its occupant took. It blurred and came back into focus when Cloud blinked his damp eyes. He clung to it, to the leather straps that crossed Zack's strong back. White light blinded him from below and he squinted down to see the buster sword lying forgotten on the ground beside them. He turned his eyes upward and stared at Zack's smiling face.

"Are you- you're really here?" The roughness in his voice surprised him, as did the hitch in his throat that followed. Could he be reduced to tears so easily?

Zack didn't seem to mind as he nodded and gave Cloud's hair another pat.

"Yeah, it's me."

"Am I..." Cloud let the question die away and looked past Zack, at the twisted wreck of metal and smoke that used to be his bike. He couldn't recognize it as Fenrir. His dead body was probably buried under the flaming engine, or worse, scattered in pieces beyond the wall of fire. He had to be dead. It was the only answer that made sense. "You came for me, huh?"

Zack followed his gaze.

"I'm sorry, Cloud. I know how much you loved that bike. But you're still alive." He gave Cloud's arm a pinch. "Would that hurt if you were dead?"

"You'd know better than me," Cloud pointed out, freshly bewildered. "So... what is this? Why'd you...?"

"It's a long story."

"That's okay." Cloud shrugged and gestured to Fenrir. "We've got a long walk back to town."

 


	2. Disillusion

Reeve was powerless to shield Denzel from his ambition. 

Confronting Cloud was his final card to play, and with Vincent's misplaced encouragement, it had blown up in his face.  Cloud worshiped Vincent.  He would have taken Reeve's side if the Turk had simply nodded in his direction.  Denzel would have rejoined the WRO.  He would have been _safe._  
  
The weight of Vincent's betrayal ground Reeve's restraint paper thin.  When his emotions burst to the surface, there was no holding them in.  
  
"I can't believe you put a knife into my back so easily!" he shouted.  "Don't you have any kind of heart?  Letting him go out there is a mockery of everything my mother sacrificed!"  
  
"She protected a child.  He's an adult now."  
  
"He still needs guidance!  If you'd ever had children you'd understand that!"    
  
Vincent's expression didn't shift, but Reeve raised a finger and pointed as if he had read his thoughts.  
  
_"Human_ children, Vincent!  What do you know about danger to regular human beings?  Nothing!"  
  
If the insult cut into Vincent, he didn't show it, but a reaction rose between them all the same.  The louder and more desperate Reeve's accusations became, the more the air clouded between them.  Thick enough to choke on, it embodied the excitement of the monsters that lurked in Vincent's blood.  In this raw moment Reeve had little armor to protect him against their vicious impulses.  If Vincent's self control similarly wavered, his mind and physical form would fall to their hands.  The threat of their arousal couldn't stop Reeve's futile crusade.  His hands clenched into fists at his sides.  The temperature of the room surged with the hunger of inhuman eyes watching him through Vincent.    
  
"I needed your support and you-"    
  
"I'm supporting you now."    
  
The calm of Vincent's voice didn't match the swiftness of his hands as they flashed forward and seized Reeve's wrists.    
  
"Let go of me,"  Reeve snapped.    
  
"Reeve-," Vincent's voice tensed with strain, and he closed his eyes to hide the wicked light glowing within.  Through his teeth a chuckle escaped, and he growled against it.    
  
"This is _my_ territory," Chaos whispered.  "Don't fight this, Vincent.  Our little toy will be quite docile when I return him to you."  
  
He gave Reeve's wrists a tug and smiled with Vincent's face as outrage and panic blended into a cocktail rarely served in the vessel before him.  Never without a little persuasion, anyway.    
  
"I'm not sure Reeve understands danger to regular humans, himself.  Why don't I test him and find out?"  
  
No longer his own, Vincent's grip tightened sharply.  It drew a grunt of pain from Reeve.  At the sound of his voice Vincent wrenched his arms downward, throwing Reeve's wrists free.  He pushed himself away and withdrew to the furthest corner of the room as if the mere distance could save Reeve from Chaos' sadistic desires.  His body shuddered and his lungs heaved.  At the sound of approaching footsteps he threw a forbidding arm outward.  Reeve had summoned Chaos with his wrath.  He could only hasten the transformation Vincent tried to subdue.  
  
Vincent spoke in a ragged voice.  
  
"I can't fight both of our demons, Reeve."  
  
"Why fight him at all?  He'll just come back," Reeve muttered as he rubbed his wrists.  They would bruise.  He'd had worse from Chaos and begged for more, but it left him sore this time.  He needed sympathy, not punishment.  
  
"I don't want him here right now," Vincent emphasized.  "Your heartbreak isn't his to play with."    
  
"My-?"  Reeve's eyebrows raised, then drew together in anger.  
  
"I won't allow Chaos to cheapen your pain for his entertainment."

The wounds in his heart more raw and demanding than the ones encircling his wrists, Reeve barked out on impulse, "If you were so concerned about my wellbeing, you would have backed me up this afternoon!"    
  
Vincent groaned a final protest as he sank to one knee; his body already beginning to change.  Reeve shaped fists with reckless courage.  Chaos wasn't here to help him, he had only come to take advantage of his pain.  That made the Weapon as good a target as Vincent for the poisonous words still boiling on the tip of Reeve's tongue.  
  
Damn the consequences, anyway.    


 

* * *

  
  
"Closest town from here is Kalm," Cloud mumbled with a blush.  He could still feel Zack's firm body against his, even though they had parted.  He shouldn't have held onto him that long.  There were more important matters at hand.  And they didn't have that kind of relationship.  They had never- well it was just-  
  
"You okay, Cloud?" Zack worried.  "Is the temperature getting to you?"  
  
"I'm fine," Cloud blushed deeper and looked away.  "We better get moving.  The monsters are bad out here these days."  
  
"I know," Zack nodded.  "I see more of the planet keepin' an eye on you than I ever did when I was alive."  
  
Having taken the first step, Cloud's feet stilled on the hard earth.  He lowered his chin and prayed his wild bangs hid his face.    
  
When Zack was alive.  That meant he was still dead.  
  
"You're not gonna stay, are you?"  
  
Zack's smile wavered between a pleasant lie and the truth.  He placed his hands on his hips; the old 'hero' pose he used to do when he gave his cadets a speech.  Those days were far behind them.  Cloud was no wide-eyed fifteen-year old.  He looked older than Zack now.    
  
"Better not talk," Cloud grumbled.  "Wastes energy."  
  
No energy need to be saved at all.  Kalm was a short distance for a spirit with unlimited strength and a man who'd traversed the planet ten times over in the past month.  But as long as Zack didn't answer Cloud's question, they were together.  Forever, if Cloud wanted to think that way.  Until the time came when they weren't anymore.  
  
First Cloud led and Zack followed, but he kept looking back, afraid to find himself alone again.  Then they walked side by side, but Cloud's eyes wandered again and he tripped.  At last Zack took Cloud's hand into his and pulled him like he was leading a lost child through the supermarket.  Cloud wouldn't accept that kind of favoritism from anyone, not even Vincent, but he let Zack guide him.  His stare remained fixed on Zack's shoulder and the side of his face.  Neither the howl of guard hounds or the vibrant sunset could lure his eyes away.    
  
Had Zack led him this way before?  Memories of those days had never returned.  He'd been mako sick then.  It affected everyone differently.  Some victims were sentient, some behaved like monsters.  Others were so weak they couldn't function on their own.  No matter how it might embarrass him, Cloud longed to remember his sickness.  In those locked up memories, Zack was still alive.  But Cloud didn't need them anymore.  Just like those days, Zack was at Cloud's side, looking out for him.  

  
  
They reached an inn just an hour after the sun set.    
  
Every bit the quaint hamlet it was before Meteorfall, Kalm was already wrapped in sleep.  No shops stayed open past six, even if the sky was still light.  The only door open to nighttime travelers was the inn, which doubled as a restaurant but served no beer.  That alone was enough motivation for Cloud to power through the last few hours' ride to Edge and Seventh Heaven, but he didn't have Fenrir to carry him home.  A part of him didn't want to go there anyway.  How could he explain Zack to everyone?  They'd probably think Cloud was being scammed by a lookalike.  They'd believe in Sephiroth before Zack.  
  
Sephiroth...  
  
He seemed so far away now, but his departure held a promise of return.  Sephiroth never lied to him.  He would come back, and their struggle would continue until Cloud defeated him or died trying.  But Cloud defeated him night after night, and Sephiroth reappeared with each new dream.  Cloud was trapped in the same maze he'd woken up in this morning.  Perhaps the only way out was death after all.  If Cloud succumbed to Sephiroth's bloody advance, he would return to the Lifestream and join his friends.  But that peace would only last the length of time it would take Sephiroth to corrupt and mutate all life on the planet.  The Lifestream wouldn't carry their souls to the Promised Land, but as dead, blackened fuel for Jenova on her journey to the next planet.  
  
No matter what, Cloud must never give in to the promise of temporary peace.  Now he had an ally in Zack.  Zack would know what to do.  Cloud believed this in his heart just as surely as he knew Sephiroth would never give up his assault on the planet.  Together they stood a chance against the bleak future Jenova planned for their world.  It wasn't just for himself that Cloud needed Zack to stay.  It was for everyone.  
  
As he tried to put that sentiment into words, Cloud was startled to hear Zack speak first.  
  
"Guess we gotta get a room, huh?"  
  
"Huh?!"  
  
"You don't have a place here, right?"  
  
"Oh, uh.  Yeah."    
  
Reeve had a house in Kalm.  A nice two-story just a few doors down from the inn.  Every time Cloud passed through town Reeve encouraged him to stay there.  Aside from using the telephone once when his cell's battery died, Cloud had never been inside the place.  He didn't want to take up the offer of Reeve's generosity tonight.  He'd probably get his hand bitten off by the little cat that stayed in the living room there.  Cait Siths weren't combat units, but they could attack in a pinch.  They probably had orders to kill him on sight.  
  
"Could you work out the room?" Zack asked.  "They'll just give me a bad deal if I do it.  My haggling skills are rusty."  
  
From the stories Yuffie had shared of her youthful adventures, Zack was the sort of guy who was completely taken advantage of whenever matters of money and items came up.  Cloud spared Zack the embarrassment of exposure and nodded.    
  
"Thanks!  I'll grab a table.  Fighting works up an appetite."  
  
Cloud didn't want to be apart from Zack for a second, but it wasn't up to him.  Zack left his side with ease, and Cloud turned to face the front desk.  Did the rooms here have one bed or two, again...?  
  
Trying to hide his embarrassment by acting tough, Cloud had the feeling he accidentally frightened the man that ran the place.  Then again, it could have been age that made that wrinkled hand shake as it scrawled Cloud's name into a book that looked just as ancient as the building itself.  Cloud wondered if it was the same book they'd written aliases in when they first came here after Midgar.    
  
Zack waved to Cloud from his seat in the back of the little restaurant.  It wasn't hard to spot him.  There were only four tables.  Cloud felt the corners of his mouth pulling into a hint of a smile.  He shyly checked it and approached the table.    
  
"Looks like there's not much of a menu here," Zack said as Cloud sat across from him.    
  
"Do you have to eat?" Cloud asked.  
  
"No, but I wanna!  I just got back and all they have tonight is dualchops!"  
  
"You don't like dualhorn?"  
  
"I do, but it would've been more fun to choose."  
  
"You sound like Denzel when he was a kid," Cloud mumbled at the table.  There was no hiding his smile now.  Maybe that was why Zack fussed so much in the first place.  
  
Their dualchops were served quickly - a sure sign they'd been zapped out of deep freeze.  The taste confirmed it.  Cloud didn't care how bad the food was.  It could be malboro stew and he'd eat it if he could share the meal with his present company.  Zack was less forgiving, and reminisced about the restaurants he'd loved in his youth as a Soldier.    
  
"And they just served it like that, the whole thing!  With an entire watermelon in its mouth!  Me and my buddies ate everything but the bones one night.  Took us three hours!"  
  
Cloud listened to Zack, happy to forget his troubles for a while and indulge in the past he'd once believed was his.  Zack gave life to stories that had only been words in Cloud's addled mind.  Swimming through the Lifestream had scrubbed every false memory from his consciousness, until the only things left were his true past and a heavy load of guilt.  Aerith cleansed the latter.  
  
Suddenly Cloud felt the urgency of Sephiroth's promise prickle on the back of his neck, and he had to interrupt Zack's colorful restaurant review.  
  
"Hey- Is um..."  
  
"What's up?"  
  
Cloud swallowed back his nerves.  There were things he needed to know, questions he couldn't put off anymore.  Zack wouldn't doubt Cloud's sanity like the others did.  He wouldn't remind him that Aerith was...  
  
"Is Aerith-?  Will I see her, too?"  
  
Zack's smile softened.  Instead of Tifa's patient worry or Barret's uncomfortable frown, Zack gave Cloud a firm nod and reached across the table to touch his hand.  
  
"She'll come.  Soon as she finishes what she's gotta do, she'll meet us here."  
  
"Tonight?" Cloud gasped.  Was it Zack's touch or his words that made Cloud's heart pound so hard in his chest?  
  
"Maybe," Zack said with an easy confidence.  "By tomorrow at the latest.  Don't worry about it, Cloud.  She's just as eager to see you as I was."  
  
Over the joyful thrumming in his ears, Cloud heard himself ask, "Where is she?"  
  
"Lifestream, somewhere," Zack supplied.  "We were both with you today.  I needed a physical form to get Sephiroth off your back, but Aerith stayed in the stream to follow his trail when he disappeared."  
  
"Is she safe on her own?"  
  
"He couldn't hurt her in a million years," Zack boasted, and then his features firmed into something more serious.  He rested his chin on his fist.  "Problem is, we can't find where he's hiding out.  She can sense him when he goes after you, but the rest of the time it's like he never existed at all."  
  
"Don't people break apart into energy in the Lifestream?"    
  
It was the common belief of the old scholars, and had become one of the main principles of the restored Lifestream-based religions.  A washing away of sins, or something like that.  Cloud didn't really buy it.  Salvation came from fixing the messes you made, not praying and doing nothing.  
  
"Yeah, but not right away.  Some people hang around to meet their families, watch over their kids, that sorta stuff."  
  
"Or follow enemies," Cloud concluded glumly.  As a teenager he would have given anything to shine in Sephiroth's eyes, just for one second.  He'd spent the rest of his life trying to take that wish back.  
  
"I'm sorry."  Zack's voice was warm and sincere. "Wish you coulda known him before."    
  
"It's okay," Cloud lied.  He wouldn't waste his evening with Zack hung up on bitter memories.  "Did Aerith know where he was before all this started?"  
  
Zack huffed in frustration.    
  
"Not really.  Every trace of Jenova is gone.  It's like she was never here in the first place.  Except she's gotta be here somewhere.  Sephiroth, too."  
  
"They're trying to come back," Cloud guessed.  His eyes lowered in shame.  "And I'm helping them."    
  
"You're not helping them, they're _using_ you," Zack insisted.  "If we team up, we can beat them."  
  
Cloud looked at the hand still grasping his.  What would his friends think about this?  He must seem silly, a man in his thirties drawing reassurance from a youth barely out of his teens.  How could anyone know Zack was Cloud's elder by several years, that he'd been...  gone for over a decade?  
  
"I..."    
  
The last time he'd heard Zack's voice, Cloud wanted to show him his strength, prove he could stand on his own.  Would he throw that away if he admitted he needed help tonight?    
  
Seeming to read Cloud's mind, Zack persisted, "You've been holding him off on your own this whole time.  Aerith and me...  We want to fight beside you."

Slowly Cloud's chin turned downward.  It wasn't fully a nod, but the energy between the pair lifted all the same.  Zack smiled.

"Let's do it together this time, okay?"  
  
"Okay," Cloud agreed, "together."  


 

* * *

  
  
The night was dark and still.  Few creatures made themselves known wherever Chaos manifested.  In the core of their being, all lifeforms sensed a danger in the Weapon far deeper than the threat of death.  Death came with the promise of rebirth.  Chaos was not a killer, but a harvester.  Whatever fell to his touch was removed from the flow of the Lifestream, trapped in stagnant mako like an insect in amber until the planet's journey ended.    
  
Of course no wild animal or unlucky passerby understood the reason behind their fear.  The legend of Chaos was lost to all but a few historians and archaeologists.  Once or twice a century some half-burnt scroll or crumbled temple was uncovered, attributed to a rogue death cult, and forgotten.  Such a tome had been the pet project of a minor branch of Shinra Company's science department, but their work had yielded no results... officially.  
  
Among the handful of people who knew the true nature of Chaos, one lay at the Weapon's side.  His limbs curled inward as if in his final moments he'd abandoned any attempt to shield himself and merely sought comfort.  His skin had yet to settle against his heavy limbs; it had been just a few minutes since his final breath.    
  
Chaos stroked Reeve's back with his human-like hand and admired the changes taking place in his body.  As old as the planet itself, created for one purpose, the Weapon loved nothing more than destruction.  He could raze a city, an entire continent on whimsy alone.  Though his chain to Omega had been severed, Chaos still wasn't free to act on his desires.  The planet's will and the Protomateria kept him in check, and guaranteed the safety of all living things.  All but a precious few who crossed his path... or sauntered into it freely.  
  
What a fight Reeve had given him!  How fiercely he'd protected the truth behind his anger.  As if Chaos didn't already know.  Those demons were old.    
  
"My brave, foolish toy," Chaos praised the man who couldn't hear him.  "Still trying to redeem yourself in your parent's eyes.  They're long scattered now.  A hundred new lives, and none of them will ever know of your effort."  
  
He lowered his lips to the curve of Reeve's ear and whispered against it, "But I do.  I know your every dream and failure.  You present them to me like a banquet and writhe so beautifully in my arms while I shatter them."  
  
Under Chaos' caress, Reeve's wrist twitched.  It was too early for his body to begin the shifts of death, but the opportunity wouldn't come.  Blood that had gone still in his veins rolled sluggishly into motion.  Lungs that had deflated swelled with shallow breaths.  With eyes that saw beyond the screens of fabric and flesh, Chaos watched Reeve's body stir in rapt fascination.  This miracle was not his bidding.  It came from within the human.  
  
"Are you happier in your brand new life?" Chaos asked with a smirk.  Regular human beings, indeed.   
  
Reeve's eyes opened.  He drew a deep breath and heaved a defeated sigh.  Neither Vincent or Chaos were forgiven, but as the Weapon had promised his human tether, Reeve had no fight left in him.   
  
The hand on Reeve's back resumed its reverent strokes. 

 


	3. Buried Memories

Cloud refused to be hunted by Sephiroth tonight.  Nothing made sense, but he didn't even care.  His head swam with desperate bliss.  He'd stolen something precious from another world, and he was sure reality would come at any moment to take it back.  He would dream of Zack, of the memories they'd shared that Cloud had long forgotten.  Or maybe he wouldn't sleep at all.  He'd lay there until morning with his eyes open.  He'd focus on the easy rise and fall of Zack's chest, find comfort in the presence of his friend.  Until Zack faded away like stars in the light of dawn, Cloud would keep watch.  
  
Light, shadow, light, shadow.    
  
Cloud was asleep, trying to make sense of a dream that had no meaning.    
  
Light, shadow, light, shadow.  
  
What was shining into his face?  Or what was blocking the light?  He opened his eyes with a grumble of irritation.  
  
In the center of the room, Zack was doing his morning squats.  Every time his body bobbed down, sunlight splashed over him and onto Cloud's face.  When Zack popped up again, he cast a shadow where the light had been.  For the span of a breath Cloud watched him, vaguely wondering what mission they'd been given, what luck had allowed him to be assigned to Zack's team.  But the days of Soldier and Shinra were gone.  The nights of Sephiroth's attacks seemed to be over, too.  Cloud sat up and let his memories fall back into place.    
  
Zack stopped his exercises and greeted him with a wave.    
  
"Slept a lot in the Lifestream," Zack explained without being asked.  "I wanna make sure I'm in top shape when it's time to battle.  Maybe pick up some fighting magazines and update my skills."  
  
Cloud yawned.  "Thought you said you were followin' me all this time.  You should've seen plenty of fighting."  
  
"It's weird in there," Zack shrugged.  "Sleeping's the same as being awake.  The past and present, you kinda live in both.  One second you're twelve.  You take a couple of steps to the left and you're nineteen.  Sometimes it feels like you're you in the future."    
A sensation Cloud knew all too well.  Sephiroth had been his guide the first time Cloud navigated his mako-soaked memories.  He'd shown him the truth none of his friends could.  The experience had forged an eerie bond of trust between them.  The more Sephiroth freed Cloud's mind, the deeper under his control Cloud slipped.  Lately Cloud wondered if he'd ever truly escaped his hold.  Maybe Sephiroth had just been waiting.  Was there a puppet string that only he knew about, just waiting to be plucked?    
  
Uncertainty pulled Cloud's thoughts back into the room.  He reached for his boots and tugged them on.    
  
"Is- is she here?"  Cloud asked, almost afraid to speak her name.    
  
Zack seemed less concerned - in fact, he was completely at ease.  
  
"Sorta.  She says she can surface, but not in town."    
  
"How do we meet her?"    
  
"The Lifestream's gotta be just so," Zack answered, scratching his head.  "It's kinda weak today.  We better try the church."    
  
"Hell of a walk."    
  
"Oh- shit, I'm sorry."  Fenrir had been a part of Cloud so long, even his ghosts couldn't accept that it was gone.  Zack recovered quickly and suggested, "How about chocobos?  You got any lure?"    
  
"You can just rent 'em now."    
  
"Oh yeah?  Bet there's money in that.  Wanna start a chocobo farm after this?"  
  
"I've already got a business.  Denzel's not ready to take the whole thing over."  
  
"He's ready.  You've been teaching him since he was a kid."  
  
Cloud bit the inside of his mouth to staunch the blush that warmed his cheeks.  His sacrifice was futile.  Zack threw an arm around his shoulder.  
  
"You did a good job raising him."  
  
"I just-"  Cloud fumbled.    
  
"Forget it," Zack said mercifully.  "Let's get some chocobos."    
  


* * *

  
  
The church always smelled clean, no matter how polluted the air around it.  Old wood and stone, fresh water and the ever-present hint of flowers, even in winter.  The flowers that grew here couldn't thrive in Nibelheim, but the scent somehow reminded Cloud of being home.  This place was more familiar to him than the cottage where he'd spent his childhood.  Memories of his youth had been long ago swallowed up in smoke and the odor of burning flesh.  The only true sanctuary left for Cloud was here, where he had first met her.    
  
Cloud always came here alone.  He'd never wanted to share this place with someone else before, not while he was inside it.  With the people's newfound interest in religion, it was getting harder and harder to find this place empty, so he rarely came at all.  A month had passed since his last visit - or had he just planned to come and forgotten?  Sephiroth's ghostly attacks had begun around the same time.  Bringing even thoughts of him into this place would be a cardinal sin.  
  
Cloud stopped with his hand resting on the handle of the door and turned to Zack for reassurance.  
  
"Go on," Zack urged.  "I'm right behind you."  
  
Cloud let the air out of his chest and opened the door.  He took another breath and stepped inside.  He walked down the aisle, hyper aware of the sound of Zack's footsteps following his.  The change in his heart was like a flower opening up to the sun.  He stopped at the edge of the water, where her garden had once grown.  There was no one.  He looked to Zack with a questioning frown.  Zack's smile disappeared, along with everything else.  Cloud blinked away the darkness, but it remained.  His frown deepened and he reached up to touch the unwelcome blindfold.    
  
Soft hands.    
  
The flower in his heart unfurled into full bloom.  
  
"Aerith."  
  
"Hello, Cloud."    
  
Her voice was gentle and carefree as ever.  Cloud's fingers folded around hers and drew them away from his stinging eyes.  The world appeared blurry through his tears, just as it had the day before.  Cloud stood still and looked at her hands in his.  His tears fell onto her palms like translucent pearls.  His lungs hitched.

  
Cloud turned to look at Aerith.  The last time he'd seen her face and touched her skin, he'd been laying her to rest in the lake.  Back then her eyes had been closed, her hands folded over her stomach to hide the fatal wound.  Now her eyes were bright.  She was warm and alive.  On their own, Cloud's arms folded around her.  He could feel Aerith's heart beating against his.  
  
Zack drew closer and put a hand on Cloud's shoulder.  Cloud closed his eyes and nodded.  The touch on his shoulder grew heavier, and then Cloud and Aerith were both pulled into the shelter of Zack's hug.  
  
"I-" Cloud choked.    
  
How could he even tell them?  He never knew the right thing to say.  They didn't ask him for words he couldn't give.  And yet the words came.    
  
"I still need you," Cloud confessed, his voice shaking with emotions he hadn't known he could feel.  "Every day you're not here, I-"  
  
"We're here now," Aerith murmured.    
  
"Let your guard down," Zack said.  "You don't have to be anybody but you anymore."  
  
As if it had been waiting for permission, Cloud's self control shattered like brittle glass.  He wept without shame and trembled under the comforting touch of the friends he had lost in his youth.  
  


* * *

  
  
"This place has changed," Aerith said happily.  "Everyone really did this?"  
  
"Yeah," Cloud nodded.  
  
They sat on the front steps of the church, watching the distant sky change colors beyond the plate.  Fallen beams of metal and brick had been cleared away and salvaged years ago; replaced with scraggly trees and bushes.  Grateful patrons, former victims of geostigma tended to them on their visits.    
  
"People sure are tough," Zack agreed.  After a moment of thought, he changed the subject.  "We've got a pretty nasty fight ahead of us.  I thought he'd show up here.  He did way back when, right?"  
  
Cloud's heart pounded loudly at the sudden reminder of why the three of them were here together.  Aerith lowered her eyes.  
  
"I didn't want to bring it up, but it _is_ what we came here for," she hemmed.  "I feel him all around us."  
  
Cloud jumped to his feet.  
  
"Sephiroth?  He's here?"  
  
"I don't think so-" Aerith began, then shook her head, "but I don't know.  He could be anywhere."  
  
Zack's eyes narrowed in thought.    
  
"What if he moved up here to get out of the Lifestream?  Maybe he's in the air, like dust."  
  
"Was he in Kalm, too?" Cloud asked.  
  
"No telling," Zack replied.  "Only Aerith can sense him."  
  
"Until I explore more of the planet's surface, I can't be sure where he is," Aerith added.  "Can you escort me for a while, Cloud?  If the air changes, I'll know where his power is strongest."  
  
Cloud's mouth tightened as he considered her request.  To lead Aerith through the cities and wilderness, to show her what the world had become - what she had given up everything to save... Was it pure selfishness that made him want to accept?  
  
"I don't know if I should," he said reluctantly.  "If it gets bad, I don't want to hurt anybody."  
  
"If we can't draw him out, we may not get to choose when and where he appears," Aerith cautioned.  
  
"It could already be too late."  
  
"Or it could mean we've got time to find a good place to fight him," Zack suggested.  "You're the key, Cloud, I know it.  He's been gunnin' for you this whole time.  Whatever he needs to come back, he thinks you've got it."  
  
"You're right."  Cloud's hand clenched.  "Until he shows up again I'm just a walking time bomb."  
  
With his good mood effectively banished, Cloud headed for the tethered chocobos.    
  
"Cloud?" Aerith asked, "where are you going?"  
  
"There's no time to waste.  I have a delivery to pick up."  
  
Zack stared.  Aerith covered her mouth and smiled.    
  
"Buddy, you can let your job slide a little right now," Zack began, but Cloud shook his head.  
  
"It'll keep us out of town for a couple of days.  If I'm the bait for Sephiroth, I don't wanna be in Edge when he comes back."  
  
"I get it.  Good plan."  Zack looked at the pair of chocobos tethered near the church.  "Just one problem.  There's three people and only two saddles.  Which one of us is gonna ride piggyback?"  
  
Cloud froze.  Though his back was to the others, the tips of his ears were pink enough to give his blush away.  This time Aerith didn't attempt to hide her giggle.  


* * *

  
  
The sun was hot above them.  Not hot enough for the sweat pouring down Cloud's forehead and neck.  He released a rein to rub his face with the back of his glove and squinted at the horizon.  Their destination wasn't even close.  It couldn't come fast enough for Cloud.    
  
...maybe that wasn't the best word, he thought with a cringe.  With every stride the chocobo bounced its jockey and his passenger, and Cloud felt Aerith's small, soft breasts squish against his back.  The heat made it worse as their clothes became damp and thin.  If she wore a bra, it had to be one of those skimpy ones, the kind made of little more than string and lace.  Was it pink like her dress?  Or-  
  
The chocobo swerved to avoid a boulder and its large body jerked underneath them, prompting Aerith to yelp and squeeze Cloud harder.  He held in a groan of distress and prayed her hands wouldn't wander too low and give his predicament away.    
  
And hour later it was a visibly stiffer, yet bravely cool Cloud who took a paper-wrapped box from a suspicious-looking gentleman behind a weapon shop.  He examined the box just long enough to memorize the address on the front.    
  
"Condor, huh?"    
  
"That a problem?"    
  
"Never is."    
  
Cloud tucked the parcel under his arm.  The client was a regular, keen on Cloud's no-questions-asked guarantee.  It could be smuggled materia for all he knew.  These goods, whatever they were, only went to the seediest bars or the richest mansions.  Nowhere in between.  Certainly not to Fort Condor.  Cloud didn't care what was different about this shipment.  That wasn't his job.  
  
"Where's your ride?"    
  
Cloud shook his head. By now some scrapper had probably found what was left of Fenrir and hauled it off to salvage.  He wasn't ready to deal with the loss, but he'd trade a hundred Fenrirs for this time with Zack and Aerith.  But a small-time contraband dealer didn't need to know that.   
  
"In the shop.  Taking it slow for a while."  
  
Cloud gestured to the trio of birds a few yards behind him.  They'd picked up one more at the rental station when they reached town.  Aerith waved from atop her chocobo, whom she'd nicknamed Speedy McStrife.  Cloud had never been more grateful and disappointed at the same time, and his feelings had nothing to do with the bird's ridiculous name.  
  
"You got a party this time, huh?" The man's voice lifted in amusement.   
  
"Yeah."    
  
"Good for you.  Safer that way."    
  
"Hope so."    
  
If only he knew how much.  The sooner they left civilization the better.  Cloud turned abruptly and left without another word.  
  


* * *

  
  
  
Years ago the WRO punched a hole straight through the mountains.  The deed was done in a single night.  How they did it, nobody knew.  Cloud had a pretty good hunch.  A few months later, a major highway between Edge and Junon was finished, and people no longer had to rely on airships or the dangerous shifting paths of the coastline.  The old mythril mine had been impassable for a decade, overtaken by the monster snakes.  Going through it was a death wish.  Naturally, that was the path Cloud selected.  
  
The plains coasted by more slowly on the back of a chocobo.  At this speed, patches of color that whooshed by Fenrir were transformed into flowers, other travelers, and the occasional wildlife.  The wind was quieter, too.  He heard his companions' voices.  They had lighthearted conversations about nothing.  Cloud learned things he'd never known before; Zack was a fan of slot machines and Aerith braided her own hair.  He shyly bragged to them about Denzel's new motorcycle and the young man who'd recently captured Marlene's heart.  
  
Fending off monsters was easier in a party.  It felt surprisingly natural to entrust half the battle to Zack and let Aerith's magic heal them.  They knew his fighting style so well because they'd always been there, watching over him.  It was like they'd been a team for years.    
  
"It should've been like this the whole time," he mused aloud over dinner that evening.    
  
Though he knew of a rest stop just a few miles away, Cloud opted to camp instead.  The pop-up tent contained enough food for four people, and was big enough for "three if we snuggle," Aerith so creatively suggested.  Zack and Cloud unrolled their sleeping bags near the campfire and refused to meet the flower girl's eyes for a full ten minutes afterward.  Now all three sat around the fire, eating their freeze-dried... whatever it was.  
  
"Y'know, I've been thinking it's beans, but this is a bone, right?" Zack asked.    
  
"It's probably just a stick," Aerith said after some hesitance.  She set her own packet down beside her.  "What was that, Cloud?"  
  
"I said it was- that's," Cloud stammered and rubbed his neck.  "We should've had this.  I've lived a whole life since- since I-  You just should've been part of it, that's all."  
  
Aerith's smile softened in understanding.  Cloud looked at his boots.  
  
"I know I'm not the only one who lost somebody.  I kept going, tried to move on.  But there's this hole where you're supposed to be, and it never goes away."  
  
"We'll keep an eye on you," Zack said when the silence grew thick.  It wasn't enough, but it was all they could offer.    
  
"When it's all over," Cloud swallowed, "I mean when- when it's my time to go...  will you two be there for me?"  
  
"That was always promised," Aerith said gently.    
  
Half a smile returned to Cloud's face.  
  
"Even if I'm an ugly old man?"  
  
Zack grinned.  
  
"It's a date.  Get some sleep, Cloud.  Nature hike from hell is tomorrow."  
  


* * *

  
  
In his dream he was back at the church.  It was fully spring in the waking world, but here the air was crisp, still clinging to the last breaths of winter.  Flowers had yet to wake from their long sleep.  His thoughts were on Aerith.  Not a living Aerith, the one of more than ten years ago.    
  
He had come here to pay respects to her memory.  
  
Why at night?  He should come during the day.  People.  There were too many here during sunlight hours.  He wanted to be alone when he reflected on her.  That explanation felt right.  
  
Cloud approached the pool.  Had he opened the doors?  They must have been open already.  Some careless visitor before him, he guessed.    
  
The moon coming through the broken roof made the water seem to glow.  Wasn't the moon obscured by the plate...?   So the light was a reflection off something.  There was nothing to question.  Everything about this was just how it should be.  No big deal.    
  
Then why did his skin crawl when he looked down into the water?  Cloud resolved to ignore it.  The phantoms that plagued him weren't real anymore.  Now what had he come here to do again?  
  
Cloud regarded his empty hands.  He didn't have anything to offer Aerith.  Perhaps it was he who wanted something.  A blessing, healing.  A sign he was on the right path.  Denzel had finally convinced him to take him on as an apprentice in the delivery business.  All they needed was to find the right set of wheels and break the news to Reeve.  Maybe that's what Cloud needed - courage.  Somehow he knew in his soul he would find the answer to his prayers in that water.  All he had to do was touch it.  
  
Cloud sat at the edge of the pool and removed his boots.  He dipped his feet in and held in a gasp at the frigid temperature.  It was colder than Nibelheim ponds.  Colder than the well at Icicle.  Still, Cloud had begun this, and to his simple, straightforward mind that meant he had to finish it.  He eased in deeper, past his ankles, up to his calves.  To get any deeper he'd have to jump in.  It felt right to.  Something he needed was waiting for him.  On the other side...  
  
From deep within the glowing water, a hand gripped Cloud's ankle and pulled.  He jerked back with a shout.  It was pulling him in- no, using him as a tether to lift itself.    
  
"Who-"  
  
Cloud kicked against the vicelike grip, but he was rooted in place.  As slowly as Cloud had let his feet sink into the water, a crown of pale hair now emerged from it.    
  
“You,” Cloud choked, “It can’t be…  you!”  
  
Not here - not in her sacred place, rising up from the healing water like some kind of corrupted angel.  This was wrong.  It shouldn’t be happening - shouldn’t be able to happen!  Cloud’s thoughts couldn’t banish the sight before him, the sensation of that hand tightening around his ankle and pulling - pulling Sephiroth further out of the water and closer to him.  
  
“I’ve longed to see you, Cloud.”  
  
He could never forget that voice, how it rolled along the inside of his spine.  Cloud wanted to close his eyes, but he was caught in Sephiroth’s wicked smile.  
  
“How…  _how?!”_

Sephiroth plowed right through Cloud's words as if he hadn't spoken at all.  He drew his knee forward, stabilized it on the wooden planks beside Cloud's thigh.  Cloud fell backward, unable to retreat.  Sephiroth followed with the patience of a spider winding prey into its web.  His fingers touched Cloud's chin.  Cloud turned his head sharply, only to have it drawn back to face his nemesis.  
  
"What do you want?" Cloud growled.    
  
"That passion never fades."  Sephiroth's smile was almost gentle, but his eyes flashed with the same hatred Cloud directed up at him.  "You were the only one strong enough to defeat me.  That's why only you will suit my needs."  
  
Cloud swung a fist upward.  Sephiroth caught it with ease and pinned it to the floor.  Between two different people it might have been a midnight liaison; writhing on the floor, entwined in a struggle for dominance.  In the pit of his stomach or somewhere lower, Cloud couldn't stamp out rising confusion.  He'd worshiped Sephiroth in his youth, even fantasized about scenarios like this once or twice.  Maybe more...  
  
But that Sephiroth was dead.  The thing above him was just a monster wearing a skin that Cloud's memories responded to.  No mass of tentacles or remnant shook Cloud from his foundation the way Sephiroth did, and Jenova knew that.  
  
"I've come just for you, Cloud."  Sephiroth's whisper was too warm, too coaxing.  "Don't fight me."  
  
"The fuck I won't!"  
  
Sephiroth's mouth turned into a cruel smile.    
  
"Then I'll just have to break your spirit."  
  
Sephiroth pressed himself closer, clasped his gloved hand firmly around Cloud's jaw and held it in place.  Cloud squeezed his eyes shut, the only resistance he could put up anymore.  He drew a breath to shout-  
  
...but he was alone in the church.  No weight held him down, no mouth bore down on his.  Cloud sat up sharply.  Even his boots were in place.    
  
None of it had been real.    
  
Cloud forced a dry laugh at himself, angry and embarrassed.  These kinds of hallucinations were frequent in the confusion before Meteorfall, but Cloud hadn't experienced one in years.    
  
"Must be slipping," he muttered to boost his morale.  The waver in his voice didn't match the person he wanted to see in himself.    
Cloud huffed in frustration.  Coming here was stupid.  He stalked away from the water, dripping with disgust as the dream faded and his mind was released to merciful emptiness.  
  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you read my older work, you probably noticed a familiar thing that happened in this chapter. Though it's no secret, this story is connected to that one, and Sephiroth's entrance is a heavy dose of foreshadowing for events to come. Does that mean what happens in the future is a sinister omen..?
> 
> Throughout this series, there's an entire story taking place outside of what I write down. I hope it makes itself clear, but just in case, I leave little hints here and there. I would like the full picture to unfold naturally for you, so that when the characters finally realize what's happening, you will have already figured it out and been shouting at them to open their eyes.


End file.
